Reclaiming Our LIBERT-E

On July 4th our thoughts turn towards our Nation’s proud history, and the hard fought rights and freedoms that we all enjoy. This Independence Day we honor those traditions, yet in the wake of the reported twin controversies surrounding the National Security Agency’s mass Internet and telecommunications surveillance, we must take a step back to question whether our security programs have gone too far. In combating the seemingly endless “War on Terror,” have we traded away too many of our fundamental rights – to privacy and due process amongst others – to enable a sprawling surveillance state?

Regrettably, my Republican colleague Justin Amash and I believe that we have reached this tipping point. And without Congressional action, it may be too late to turn the tide against the federal government’s encroachment on our civil liberties.

It is for these reasons that we have introduced H.R. 2399, the “Limiting Internet and Blanket Electronic Review of Telecommunications and Email Act,” or the LIBERT-E Act for short.

The intent of this legislation is twofold: to shine needed light on the secretive processes by which the federal government is able to snoop on American citizens, and to raise the standard for any federal agency engaging in surveillance activities to prevent the mass collection of private information. These two main components of the LIBERT-E Act reform both the PATRIOT Act and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Amendments (FISA) Act.